Hudson River

“ Lawrence would carry the Hudson as a trophy in his belt and hardly know the difference; yet our river is doubtless the most beautiful of them all. It pleases like a mountain lake. It has all the sweetness and placidity that go with such bodies of water, on the one hand, and all their bold and rugged scenery on the other. In summer, a passage up or down its course in one of the day steamers is as near an idyl of travel as can be had, perhaps, anywhere in the world. ”

“ From their eastern front, where the huge hotels, built at twenty-four hundred feet elevation, are anchored by ponderous chain cables to keep them from being overthrown by the wind, there is an unrivalled view over the valley. The Hudson River stretches 187 a silvery streak across the picture, and can be traced nearly a hundred miles from West Point up to Albany. Its distant diminutive steamboats slowly move, and like a shining thread, as the western sun strikes the car-windows and is reflected, a railway train glides along the bank ten miles away, seen so well, and yet so small. ”

“ The wealth of the great city at its mouth, the metropolis of the young nation, has been lavished upon the soil of the river's borders to make it even more beautiful and more fruitful. What river in America, along the same length of coast-lines as from Troy to New York (one hundred and fifty-six miles) , can rival in natural beauty and artificial applications of wealth the lovely Hudson? "The Hudson River," says its genial historian, Mr. Lossing, "from its birth among the mountains to its marriage with the ocean, measures a distance of full three hundred miles." ”

“ Among all the rivers of the world the Hudson is acknowledged queen, decked with romance, jewelled with poetry, clad with history, and crowned with beauty. More than this, the Hudson is a noble threshold to a great continent and New York Bay a fitting portal. The traveler who enters the Narrows for the first time is impressed with wonder, and the charm abides even with those who pass daily to and fro amid her beauties. No other river approaches the Hudson in varied grandeur and sublimity, and no other city has so grand and commodious a harbor as New York. ”

“ A company of clerks and engagés had been obtained in Montreal, and the party leaving Canada went in their great canoe up Lake Champlain, took it over the portage to the Hudson, and descended that river to New York. They transferred the picturesque scene so often witnessed on the Ottawa to the sleepy banks of the Hudson River, and with emblems flying, and singing songs of the voyageurs, surprised the spectators along the banks. Arrived at New York the men with bravado expressed themselves as ready to endure hardships. ”

“ Hudson River, a river in New York state and one of the most beautiful in America. It rises in the Adirondack Mountains, 4,326 feet above sea level. At Glens Falls it drops 50 feet, then, taking a southerly direction, flows into the bay of New York. There is tidal influence for 151 miles from its mouth to Troy, and it is navigated by large steamboats to Albany. About 60 miles from New York city the river enters the highlands, the scene of Arnold's treason and André's death, towering abruptly from the water to a height of 1,600 feet. ”

“ Everywhere he presented gifts to the Indians to induce them to go down to the Bay. On the way back to York, the explorers canoed all the way down the Saskatchewan, and Hendry paused at Fort La Corne, half-way down to Lake Winnipeg. The banks were high, high as the Hudson river ramparts, and like those of the Hudson, heavily wooded. Trees and hills were intensest green, and everywhere through the high banks for a hundred miles below what is now Edmonton bulged great seams of coal. The river gradually widened until it was as broad as the Hudson at New York or the St Lawrence at Quebec. ”

“ The old grist mill there belongs to the Revolutionary period, and the Shawangunk Mountains rise in rugged, frowning peaks which overlook the valley and form a background of rare beauty. The heights of the Hudson River are seen in the distant horizon toward the east and north, and there is a rare combination of upland, valley, mountain and stream, forest slopes and well tilled farms which charms the beholder and forms a most attractive and beautiful landscape. Summer visitors are attracted here in large numbers, and they find much to admire and enjoy. ”

“ Such a river as the Hudson could not have its origin in a low, marshy country, and its flow seaward, in any but a healthy region, but the inducement to seek that country must be more than the mere sentiment of beauty. There must seem to be a prospect of bettering one’s condition, so far as physical comforts, or civil and religious rights are concerned. Hudson, after his exploration of the Hudson river, on his return to Europe, took back there many very valuable furs which he obtained from the Indians in exchange for trinkets of little cost and of still less real value. ”

“ The remote sources of the Hudson River are in Hamilton and Essex Counties, in the Adirondacks, in northeastern New York State, the highest at four thousand feet elevation above the sea, the head streams being outlets for a large number of highland lakes. The river flows over three hundred miles to the sea, and has few tributaries, the largest being the Hoosac and the Mohawk. Its lower course is a long tidal estuary, the tidal head being at Troy, from whence the fall in level to the ocean is only about five feet. ”

“ THE DEVIL'S DANCE-CHAMBER. Most storied of our New World rivers is the Hudson. Historic scenes have been enacted on its shores, and Indian, Dutchman, Briton, and American have invested it with romance. It had its source, in the red man's fancy, in a spring of eternal youth; giants and spirits dwelt in its woods and hills, and before the river-Shatemuc, king of streams, the red men called it—had broken through the highlands, those mountains were a pent for spirits who had rebelled against the Manitou. ”

“ The ride up the mountains on the incline railway is a novel and delightful experience, and is alone worth a visit to the Catskills. As the train ascends, the magnificent panorama of the valley of the Hudson, extending for miles and miles, is gradually unfolded; while the river itself, like a ribbon of silver glistening in the sun, and the Berkshire Hills in the distance seem to rise to the view of the passenger. ”

“ The Mississippi is like an oak with enormous branches. What a branch is the Red River, the Arkansas, the Ohio, the Missouri! The Hudson is like the pine or poplar—mainly trunk. From New York to Albany there is only an inconsiderable limb or two, and but few gnarls and excrescences. Cut off the Rondout, the Esopus, the Catskill and two or three similar tributaries on the east side, and only some twigs remain. There are some crooked places, it is true, but, on the whole, the Hudson presents a fine, symmetrical shaft that would be hard to match in any river in the world. ”

“ Of the river scenery of America, the Hudson, at West Point, is doubtless the boldest and most beautiful. This powerful river writhes through the highlands in abrupt curves, reminding one, when the tide runs strongly down, of Laocoon in the enlacing folds of the serpent. The different spurs of mountain ranges which meet here, abut upon the river in bold precipices from five to fifteen hundred feet from the water’s edge; the foliage hangs to them, from base to summit, with the tenacity and bright verdure of moss ”

“ The tide in the Hudson River is the continuation of the tide-wave, which comes up from the ocean through New York Bay, and is carried by its own momentum one hundred and sixty miles, growing, of course, constantly smaller, until it is finally stopped by the dam at Troy. ”

“ The city itself comes into the left of the picture to an advantage seen from no other point of view. The flocks of river-craft scud past in all directions; men-of-war, merchantmen, steamers, and ferry-boats fill up the moving elements of the panorama; and far away beyond stretches the broad harbor, with its glassy or disturbed waters, in all the varieties of ever-changing sea-view. It was on this side that Hudson, who had felt the hostility of the Manhattan Indians, found a friendlier tribe, and made his first amicable visit on shore. ”

“ The importance of the Hudson river to the old settled parts of the state, may be observed in the immense wealth which is daily borne on its waters, in the flourishing villages and cities on its banks, and in the opulence and prosperity of all the country connected with it, either remotely or immediately. ”

“ Henry Hudson was the first white man who ever sailed up the Hudson River. He was an English sailor in the service of the Dutch, who sent him on a voyage to North America. While sailing along the Atlantic coast he entered the bay of New York, and passing inland discovered the beautiful river that bears his name. ”

“ A glance at the map will show that the Hudson River, which falls into the Atlantic at New York, runs down from the north at the back of the New England States, forming an angle of about forty-five degrees with the line of the coast of the Atlantic, along which the New England States are situate. Northward of the Hudson we see a small chain of lakes communicating with the Canadian frontier. ”

“ The Hudson River group occupies a large part of the surface of the county, and consists of slates, shales, grits, limestones, breccias and conglomerates. It extends from the Hudson River through Warwick to the Jersey line, and from the Hudson at Cornwall Landing to four miles above Newburgh. It is stratified with grawacke and grawacke slate. It forms the surface rock of the most of Goshen and Blooming Grove, and parts of Cornwall, New Windsor, Newburgh, Montgomery, Hamptonburgh, Crawford, Wallkill, Mt. Hope and Minisink. ”

“ Asher, in his publication, says: “Hudson river, Hudson strait and Hudson bay remind every educated man of the illustrious navigator by whom they were explored.” But though the name of Henry Hudson possesses the preservative against oblivion, little more has been done in its behalf, and few persons have any accurate notion of the real extent of its merits. By considering 61 Hudson as the discoverer of the three mighty waters that bear his name, we indeed both overrate and underrate his deserts. ”

“ Starting from such a cradle, the Hudson, like a young Hercules playing with serpents, catches up a hundred little tributary brooks, and goes leaping and brawling through the woods till it finds itself a river. Then, gathering size and strength through every curve of its way, it turns eastward to seek its fortunes in the big world. ”

“ Residents of the East pronounce it superior to the Hudson, and travelers assert there is nothing like it in the Old World. It is simply delicious to those escaped from the heat and dust of their far-off homes to embark on this noble stream and steam smoothly down past frowning headlands and "rocks with carven imageries," bluffs lined with pine trees, vivid green, past islands and falls, and distant views of snowy peaks. There is no trip like it on the coast, and for a river excursion there is not its equal in the United States. ”

“ The city is at the head of navigation of the Hudson river, and is one of the most interesting in America, with its commerce passing through its "open door" down the historic Hudson river, through the Erie canal and over the New York Central lines. ”

“ This tribe, a sub-tribe of the Mahicans, held the east bank of the river, from Manhattan to Roeliffe Jansen's Creek, which empties into the Hudson near Livingston, a few miles south of Catskill Station on the Hudson River Railroad. Passing Hampton Point we see Marlborough, the head-centre of a large fruit industry, delightfully located in the sheltered pass of the Maunekill. On the east bank will be noticed several fine residences: "Uplands," "High Cliff," "Cedars," and "Netherwood." Milton is now at hand on the west bank, with its cosy landing and West Shore Railroad station. ”

“ The advent in 1849 of the Hudson River Railroad, which was an enterprise in its day of startling courage and magnitude, constituted a special epoch in the history of Poughkeepsie and the Hudson River towns. Men of middle age here well remember the hostility and ridicule the project occasioned when it was first broached. Some said no railroad ever could be built on the river's edge ”

“ There you will find the Hudson River, and follow it up north from the city of New York, past Albany, the capital of the state, until it ends in a region of mountains. Near its upper waters is a long, narrow lake named Lake George, which is full of beautiful islands. ”

“ The land southwestward of Hudson's River is more regularly divided and into a greater number of stages than the other. The first object worthy of regard in this part is a rief or vein of rocks of the talky or isinglassy kind, some two or three or half a dozen miles broad; rising generally some small matter higher than the adjoining land; and extending from New York city southwesterly by the lower falls of Delaware, Schuylkill, Susquehanna, Gun-Powder, Patapsco, Potomack, Rapahannock, James river and Ronoak. ”

“ We do know that Hudson, the Navigator’s name was Henry and not Hendrick, as so often called and even now blazoned on the newest and finest 18 steamboat on the Hudson river, as evidenced in his contract with the Amsterdam directors of the Dutch East India Company, a copy of which follows. We know that he was and remained an Englishman when on his return from his third voyage (for the Dutch) the English government forbade him and all the Englishmen with him to enter any service other than for her own country. ”